The Dance was a serial published by numerous publishers between 1923 and 1931, when it was part of the Good Story Magazine Company of New York published by Harold Hersey. It appeared on a monthly basis, was edited by Paul R. Milton, and was devoted to the "happenings in theater and motion pictures." John Vassos executed a series of 6 original works, beginning with Vol. 14, October 1930 and concluding with Vol. 16, May 1931. No mention of these works could be found in any of the records in the John Vassos Papers. Holdings for this serial include the Dance Collection of the New York Public and the Northwestern University Libraries. The page size measured 315 x 240mm.
"The first full-page drawing by John Vassos – which he calls Skyscraper Dance. In chaste black, white, and gray Mr. Vassos has conceived and interpreted an amazing idea in the sweeping style which has made him one of America's foremost artists. This drawing is not only a symbolic interpretation of Today in its incessant reaching for the topmost skies, but it is also a concrete experiment in the designing of a new type of dance setting. Lighting plays a most important part in the design, while an effect of mystery is derived from the two figures; the man in black and white and the woman in silver, representing a cloud. The height of the whole adds a new dimension to the dance, and its quality a new value."
The editor remarks in an editorial that "Vassos' work lies not only in its intrinsic artistic value, but also in that he gives dancers new and concrete ideas for them to use."
John Vassos has here caught in pigments the fabled dance of Orpheus and Eurydice. Orpheus the lute player, through his music's spell, has persuaded Pluto, king of Hades, to release his dead love Eurydice. But the one condition was that the daring lover should precede the girl on the journey to the living world, without looking back. But he could not resist turning for one look, one kiss... and knows as he turns, that he has lost his beloved again, this time eternally. Her temporary awakening, filled with desire and passion, passes, and she sinks back to death. Thwarted desire, pathos, and agony are the key-notes of this dance's tempo. The black wrap, the chasms of ice, and the twisted trees are symbolic of hopelessness. In the crescendo Eurydice vanishes. The conception is neo-classic, and John Vassos visualizes it danced to some such modern music as Respighi's."
"Traffic is seen as a stream of movement in futurist rhythm, an abstract result of this age. In the foreground the hero, the soloist dancer, interprets the increasing tempo, while behind him in ceaseless flux the ensemble moves onward... getting nowhere but ever pushing forward on the treadmill of traffic. The artist visualizes this dance executed with lights fastened behind the bumper-like hands of the performers to illumine the faces."
"The two figures of the dancers repeat in their flying draperies the light and shadow motif of the moon and the cloud above, and of the wave and the foam below. Even the dance itself moves in the curving lines of the waltz, repeating the concentric circles which come from the full moon, like waves from a stone dropped in a still pool. The Woman wears while, and the Man a dark cloth about his body, and the flying scarves are silver on one side and jet on the other. The stage is a silver platform."
"Men move in unison; they produce the same thoughts, the same objects. Before them dances a single figure, moving in the stereotyped measures that the mass demands. Behind him dances his soul, the invisible soul ever protesting, fighting, striving in vain to break the bonds of mass production and mass demand. In vain, for the man himself is only a product of the machine."
"This month John Vassos goes back to the classic for his dance conception – the eternal story of Paris and Helen of Troy, for whom a ten-year war was waged. Here is pictured the moment when Paris comes for Helen, and the dance depicts the beginning of the great romance."
The original illustration for this work is held as part of the John Vassos Papers at the SUL.